LETTER: The new virus: too soon to panic
Jeremy Sampson is right about one aspect of this latest worldwide virus outbreak
Jeremy Sampson (Media & Advertising, February 6-12) (https://www.businesslive.co.za/redzone/news-insights/2020-02-06-jeremy-sampson-coronavirus-a-real-game-changer/) is right about one aspect of this latest worldwide virus outbreak: the interconnectivity in modern communications means panic spreads fast around the globe, causing unnecessarily and extreme reaction on many fronts. But, as he says, correction will undoubtedly be quick — assuming, of course, we’re not in for a pandemic such as the Spanish flu of 1918-1919, which killed an estimated 50-million people and slowed recovery after World War 1.
If there was any "panic" at the time of the other 20th-century pandemics — the Asian flu of 1957-1958 (I was a "victim" at preparatory school), or the 1968-1969 Hong Kong flu, which killed about 1-million — the world did not grind to a halt. Far from it; those were boom times...
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